The Republican coalition is often described as a three-legged stool made up of foreign policy, social issue and fiscal conservatives. It’s an apt metaphor because it captures the fact that all three legs need to be secure in order for the party to keep from collapsing.

For most of the last two decades, foreign policy (strong defense) and social (traditional values) conservatives have at various times been blamed for Republican defeats. But fiscal conservatism (lower and fewer taxes; less government spending) has always escaped from Republican losses unscathed.

2012 produced a different outcome. Everyone agrees that the 2012 election was about the economy, and that Republicans suffered a drubbing.

I’m a fiscal conservative who believes in lower taxes and entitlement program reform. But politically, these issues appear to be the weakest leg of the Republican coalition. The public is more than willing to raise taxes on the rich, and they don’t want cuts in Social Security and Medicare.

Despite the unpopularity of these ideas, various Republican office holders and pundits continue to blame social issues for election defeats.

Fiscal conservatives fail to get their message across because a substantial part of our citizenry has no idea of the difference between million, billion, and trillion. Moreover, they couldn’t care less as long as they can keep using their credit cards & food stamps. They can still watch movies, TV, drive around (albeit at much higher prices), drink their Starbucks latte or their Michelob, so there. Most of the voters are deeply in debt themselves, and nothing much happens, right? In fact, many of our elected bureaucrats don’t know how to balance their own budget, and they get to keep an eye on our national outgo?!